Is QF Uncompetitive ?

[viscount]

Yes CX is much better than Qantas. So is SG! And Thai! Qantas need to learn a lesson and improve on their service and their competitiveness.

 

[amaroo]

It's now the QF Rant thread......

Everyone wants 5* employment conditions ... unfortunately, most don't want to pay for it!

 

[legroom]

Yes CX is much better than Qantas. So is SG! And Thai! Qantas need to learn a lesson and improve on their service and their competitiveness.

It would have been better if you could enumerate the 'lesson(s)' which you would like QF to learn from.

The award conditions in Australia for Australians are (... insert your adverbs here...) not the same as those in Dubai or Hong Kong.

Offering the same market pricing while incurring a different (higher) cost base would be difficult for most if not all businesses.

Ps: I'm guessing that SG meant SQ ?

 

[wenglock.mok]

My own personal feelings on this are that:

- With the refurbishment of the A330s heading internationally and B744s and A380s with new cabins, they will finally be up there in terms of the hard product. The food is actually not that bad and entertainment variety actually pretty decent.

- However, some of the cabin crews flying internationally could really show some interest in actually being there. It is quite unfortunate, but I've seen quite a few instances when flying internationally of cabin crew that look like they don't actually want to be there. This is something I seldom encounter when flying domestically as most of the domestic crew (and even the Jetconnect crews) actually appear to be enthusiastic and happy to have you onboard. Cabin crew are the face of the airline and can make or break a flight.

I believe QF actually ran a workshop some years back to refresh the notion of service in their service staff but I'm not sure how far that went as the inconsistency is still happening on international flights, which is quite disappointing and just spoils the good name of the airline especially with passengers from overseas.

So to summarise, they are better than they were a few years back. However, still a few steps behind the likes of CX, SQ or even EK.

 

[zoomzoom]

Yes, a crew can make all the difference. The fundamental problem is price and product. Too expensive, product not as good. Add that QF now has very limited destinations as QF, they are marginalised. QF has given up on the business market except for a couple of routes. The Pacific, where they are protected. Dropped the fares when Virgin/Delta started to fly. If Singapore ever got rights then there would be real choice and competition.In Asia, QF is very limited. To Singapore, they offer an expensive business class or a very rough economy product. BA offer premium economy and at last Singapore are introducing a very good looking Premium Economy product. And of course QF still has fleet limitations. Why no 777 or 787 aircraft? Management got it wrong, so are paying a very heavy price.

Part of the problem with crews is the result of the way Qf management has behaved over the years.You need to build corporate culture over years, not trash staff at every opportunity. Just look at what John B has achieved at Virgin. I wonder what QF would be like today if they had appointed the current CEO of Virgin as MD a few years ago. I would better it would be a totally different and much better airline. QF just react, to competitors and in particular Virgin. And Virgin has been 2 steps ahead ever since they appointed John B. I am a total fan of his style and ability.

 

[gupayami]

This is a fair question, though it really only applies to flying from the west coast as QF would need to fly you to the east coast first and can't compete with CX / EK. If flying from the east coast to the US, then flights on CX / EK are much longer and more expensive (I did however fly CX from SYD to ORD once as I didn't want to fly US domestic ). If QF tried to undercut EK / CX prices from Perth they would probably lose money I suspect (and they should still get much of the corporate / govt market as already discussed)

Doing some planning / snooping around for some fares for a flight between Perth & New York, and for the sake of this discussion used the dates 1/6/15 to 8/6/15

Emirates - $8,523
CX - $9,077
QF - $10,784

I want to fly QF but why would you spend the extra $2.2K for loyalty?

 

[dajop]

Even on routes where it runs daily, QF's frequency is poor or mostly less than its competitors. It still considers SYD as its hub: despite Melbourne and Victoria gaining 100,000 net new residents every year and Melbourne now being not much smaller than Sydney, not many QF flights run nonstop from or to Melbourne internationally.

Forget the SYD comparison, look at the comparison to BNE & MEL.

It's all about rugby

Believe it or not, QF actually flies non-stop to more international destinations from BNE (7) than MEL(6). In fact QF seems to be happy to handover MEL to Jetstar. (eg. BNE gets QF services to Tokyo & Queenstown , MEL gets Jetstar)

But to be fair to QF it is running a business, not a national service (it is no longer our national carrier, it is just another business), and MEL is blessed with a range of great alternatives from NZ, SQ, CX, TG, MH, EK, EY, QR etc... As is Perth.

 

[Alanslegal]

I mentioned previously that when QF has sale fares they can be really worthwhile but just thinking aloud here, my family would never consider QF as a first choice carrier when flying out of Australia (they think SQ and CX). Thinking about my team here at work, none of them flew QF long haul for leisure purposes in the last 24 months. Etihad was the main carrier for getting them to Europe. And my close group of friends who are flying to my wedding in USA in two months, none of them are flying QF either. Most ended up on UA flights, and some are flying on NZ Y+ (for $2,000 return was pretty good value there). I don't know what the reason is but none of my circle of people I know rarely choose QF.

I have also been to a focus group to talk about QF and EK and those groups, surprisingly no one rated QF highly either. The people in the groups always suggested that if QF was a person, he would be male, 50years old, middle management office worker, who drinks at the local pub, and conservative. When they would mention who EK would be, that person would be mid 30's, loves to show off, drinking at some swanky rooftop bar and being friends with everyone, he would probably buy drinks for everyone too. When asked who would people rather be, and it appears most want to have an EK behaviours.

QF being that legacy airline, I guess it is hard to re-invent themselves to be younger, newer, more contemporary than the others. Sure its the safest airline in the world and alot of flyers put that as number one priority, however there are many out there who don't and perceive service, price value, destination choices, as their priorities. QF to me, is an old boys club, and to me - that's what drives them. Keep the corporate guys happy, give every politician CL status, and if you wear thongs into the Qantas Lounge yet you are a very well off Gen X or Y, then go bugger off somewhere else.

 

[Old Dynamite]

Tell us what you really think.

You should seriously fly BA more often

BA are a bit blase too.

Royal Brunei are the way to go to London. Great planes (787), great seats in Business, and no yuppies!

 

[burmans]

BA are a bit blase too.

Royal Brunei are the way to go to London. Great planes (787), great seats in Business, and no yuppies!

And no free alcohol! Though personally I agree the prices more than make up for that!

 

[Melburnian1]

Just look at what John B has achieved at Virgin. I wonder what QF would be like today if they had appointed the current CEO of Virgin as MD a few years ago. I would better it would be a totally different and much better airline. QF just react, to competitors and in particular Virgin. And Virgin has been 2 steps ahead ever since they appointed John B. I am a total fan of his style and ability.

I don't want to get too 'off topic' as this is a discussion about QF and whether it is uncompetitive.

While I agree with zoomzoom, in fairness, VA is still incurring losses, albeit less than a while ago, so the financial jury is still out on VA and CEO Mr JB. That said, he appears to run his airline pretty competently while keeping staff happy and encouraging them to do their best, always difficult when David is up against a relative Goliath like QF. One of AJ and JB seems a much nicer person than the other, and deserves to succeed.

 

[Renato1]

Gauging the competitiveness of Qantas can't be done solely on the price of its flights alone. If those flights, which have been shown in previous threads to be higher than those of its competitors, fly half empty - then plainly Qantas is uncompetitive. But if those flights are relatively full - then Qantas is competitive, and is just maximizing its profit.

Qantas is uncompetitive for me personally because of its routes. I live in Melbourne and want to fly to Venice. With Qantas I typically have had to fly to Sydney, transfer to another plane, then land in Rome, transfer to an Alitalia flight and go to Venice. That adds four or five hours to the trip, and may cost me more.

So I'll always be flying Emirates which flies out of Melbourne and gets me straight to Venice via Dubai. Though plainly, this wouldn't be as big an issue for people living in Sydney.

That said, I have to admit that when I'm overseas and get into a Qantas plane, I feel like I'm home already, as opposed to being on a foreign plane flying home.
Regards,
Renato

 

[dajop]

So I'll always be flying Emirates which flies out of Melbourne and gets me straight to Venice via Dubai. Though plainly, this wouldn't be as big an issue for people living in Sydney.

But flying out of Sydney to Venice is no different. It has been many years since you've been able to fly to Rome on Qantas.

And did you know the quickest way from MEL to Venice and back is on Qantas between MEL and Dubai and then Emirates to Venice. So if you book the quickest flights on Emirates website on Emirates coded flights - it actually would be on Qantas aircraft between MEL and DXB in both directions (QF 9 and 10)! This is one of the advantages of QF's deal with Emirates.

 

[katiebell]

I recently looked at LHR-DXB: QF was considerably cheaper when compared with EK & BA (in 3 classes).

I noticed it was much easier to get discount J Aus-LHR once the route changed to DXB and, conversely, much harder in CX. This seems to be a lottery at present; with the cheaper airline depending on the day of travel.

QF have better meals, more adjustable seats (but no aisle access for all in J), mostly good crew in J (but not in Y) but not such good aircraft and much poorer selection of flight times and a much worse transit point when compared with CX. Whilst I would prefer to fly with an Australian business I will not do so if it costs a lot more.

To North America CX are a much more competitive option with similar flight times, international product the whole way, no LAX transits and not US TSA antagonism if going to Canada. They are also expanding their European ports so are a great one stop option. Unlike QF, they choose the right aircraft for ultra-longhaul (777) and can, therefore, afford to start new routes and build up numbers.

The degrading of the frequent flyer programme really is QF at its most uncompetitive (especially given that it is meant to be a profitable operation). It is not an incentive to book QF when it costs more, rather it is an incentive to find another FF programme and stop crediting QF: as a L

 

[Deleted member]

I mentioned previously that when QF has sale fares they can be really worthwhile but just thinking aloud here, my family would never consider QF as a first choice carrier when flying out of Australia (they think SQ and CX). Thinking about my team here at work, none of them flew QF long haul for leisure purposes in the last 24 months. Etihad was the main carrier for getting them to Europe. And my close group of friends who are flying to my wedding in USA in two months, none of them are flying QF either. Most ended up on UA flights, and some are flying on NZ Y+ (for $2,000 return was pretty good value there). I don't know what the reason is but none of my circle of people I know rarely choose QF.

I have also been to a focus group to talk about QF and EK and those groups, surprisingly no one rated QF highly either. The people in the groups always suggested that if QF was a person, he would be male, 50years old, middle management office worker, who drinks at the local pub, and conservative. When they would mention who EK would be, that person would be mid 30's, loves to show off, drinking at some swanky rooftop bar and being friends with everyone, he would probably buy drinks for everyone too. When asked who would people rather be, and it appears most want to have an EK behaviours.

QF being that legacy airline, I guess it is hard to re-invent themselves to be younger, newer, more contemporary than the others. Sure its the safest airline in the world and alot of flyers put that as number one priority, however there are many out there who don't and perceive service, price value, destination choices, as their priorities. QF to me, is an old boys club, and to me - that's what drives them. Keep the corporate guys happy, give every politician CL status, and if you wear thongs into the Qantas Lounge yet you are a very well off Gen X or Y, then go bugger off somewhere else.

An interesting analogy. I made a similar observation, except to say if EK & QF were female. EK would be Dame Edna and QF Madge Allsop !!

 

[Renato1]

But flying out of Sydney to Venice is no different. It has been many years since you've been able to fly to Rome on Qantas.

And did you know the quickest way from MEL to Venice and back is on Qantas between MEL and Dubai and then Emirates to Venice. So if you book the quickest flights on Emirates website on Emirates coded flights - it actually would be on Qantas aircraft between MEL and DXB in both directions (QF 9 and 10)! This is one of the advantages of QF's deal with Emirates.

I know one can fly with Emirates from Sydney to Dubai to Venice. But do Qantas planes do the same route, or do they only go as far as Rome?


Via the Emirates timetable, they used their own plane up till the 27 March for Melbourne to Dubai and then switched to the partner airline afterwards. For Dubai to Melbourne they have direct flights with Emirates planes, which I've booked.

I can't see the advantage of the QF deal with Emirates. Before Emirates provided the plane, and now Qantas does. Maybe the numbers were down on that route because everyone likes the stopover via the Singapore or Kuala Lumpur route.
Regards,
Renato

 

[Ansett]

I know one can fly with Emirates from Sydney to Dubai to Venice. But do Qantas planes do the same route, or do they only go as far as Rome?


Via the Emirates timetable, they used their own plane up till the 27 March for Melbourne to Dubai and then switched to the partner airline afterwards. For Dubai to Melbourne they have direct flights with Emirates planes, which I've booked.

I can't see the advantage of the QF deal with Emirates. Before Emirates provided the plane, and now Qantas does. Maybe the numbers were down on that route because everyone likes the stopover via the Singapore or Kuala Lumpur route.
Regards,
Renato

Qantas metal only fly's to Dubai or London it does NOT fly to any other destination in Europe. From Dubai to any destination other than London you will change to EK Metal.

 

[MrBean]

Doing some planning / snooping around for some fares for a flight between Perth & New York, and for the sake of this discussion used the dates 1/6/15 to 8/6/15

Emirates - $8,523
CX - $9,077
QF - $10,784

I want to fly QF but why would you spend the extra $2.2K for loyalty?

Those prices are ridiculous. You can get prices from Perth to the U.S for $4K if you really shopped around. I would never pay that much to fly any of those carriers, but I guess that's just my personal preference.
You should try and look for flights from Melbourne and Sydney as well cause they operate more flights and have lower fares.

That's just my 2 cents

Cheers
Ian Pinto

 

[clazman]

Those prices are ridiculous. You can get prices from Perth to the U.S for $4K if you really shopped around. I would never pay that much to fly any of those carriers, but I guess that's just my personal preference.
You should try and look for flights from Melbourne and Sydney as well cause they operate more flights and have lower fares.

That's just my 2 cents

Cheers
Ian Pinto

You think you can get Perth to New York in J for $4k? please show me

 

[MrBean]

Clazman .... send me your e-mail address to p i n t o i a n @a o l . c o m